


catch me in a smile (kiss a laugh into my lungs)

by ThisUsernameTaken



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: (@ Tony), ???? - Freeform, BAMF Pepper Potts, Drabble, F/M, Fluff, Light Angst, Love, No Plot/Plotless, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pining, Sappy, Short, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Wrote this in uhhhh September, honestly dont set your expectations too high folks, i forget there are all these extra tony tags lmaokasghsdg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-03-09
Packaged: 2019-11-14 03:27:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18044597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisUsernameTaken/pseuds/ThisUsernameTaken
Summary: But when he can, he looks at her.Stealing glances, sneaking blinks. Staring in awed fixation and admiring adoration.(Sunglasses are so great. Was he reading that sign? Smiling sappily at that lady in heels? Or was he readingthatsign?)--(He never did realize how she looks at him just the same.)





	catch me in a smile (kiss a laugh into my lungs)

Sometimes, when the world stands still, Tony stills with it. He quiets, heart jittering to a calm steady beat as his breaths come slow and just a little less on the side of agony.

And during those sometimes, those fleeting moments to just  _ be _ , he looks. 

Looks at his hands. His workshop. The whole world stretched out beneath him, above him, before him and back. Sometimes he looks at nothing at all. 

 

But when he can, he looks at her. 

 

Stealing glances, sneaking blinks. Staring in awed fixation and admiring adoration.

 

(Sunglasses are so great. Was he reading that sign? Smiling sappily at that lady in heels? Or was he reading  _ that  _ sign?)

 

Muted fire cascading over pale strong shoulders in the soft glare of sunset. Eyes wide and bright and blue as the sky and ocean and all wonderful things. Curled into a whip. Iced over in cool fury. Falling freely, gaze open and soft. 

 

Not at him, though. Not for him, or because of him. At other things, other people. Better people. But that’s okay. (He never did realize how she looks at him just the same.)

 

Until one day she catches him, his glasses ill-stuffed in a suit pocket, gaze unguarded and open. One day she catches him, catches him tracing the constellations on her cheeks with the keen eye of an engineer. She catches him and he catches her back, even if he’s not quite sure what he’s caught yet. (He’s suspected she’d always sort of knew, anyway.)

 

They catch one another, fingers tangling together, mouths pulled in smiles and into each other, smiling still. 

 

Before that, she catches him, he catches her. Their gazes meet like friction, and suddenly all air in the room is gone, save the breaths shared between them. She smiles at him, then, a flash of a thing. And then she’s gone.

 

The air rushes back as her hair flashes out the room, leaving him light-headed and breathless. What the hell?

 

He doesn’t know what to make of it, but it’s left a funny ache in his chest he can’t define.

 

She’s caught him anyhow, and as the moments grow longer, softer, quieter, he allows himself to look over, just a little bit.

 

Pepper, running the company, all clean cut lines and competence, the clack of heels through corridors exuding elegance and power.

Pepper, brilliant and lovely and with laughter that set his heart to soaring.

 

Pepper, Pepper, Pepper.

 

She cups his face like glass, threads fingers through his hair, smooths circles into his cheeks. And as he closes his eyes and melts into her touch she whispers,  _ Tony.  _   
  
He loves her so much he can’t breathe.


End file.
